For instance, the hollowed-out interior of the mountain is so well described that by the end of the book the reader is capable of drawing a map of its intricate corridors and chambers, its booby traps and depots-and especially its high-suction toilet that has the talismanic force of a coffin.“
In a 1988 New York Times review, Edmund White wrote about the book: “It is a wildly improbable fable when recalled, but it proceeds with fiendishly detailed verisimilitude when experienced from within. The narrator’s use of rich, vivid detail is a hint of things to come. Although the distorted reflection of my surroundings was amusing, my own twisted image seemed merely pitiful.“ With that raincoat on, I looked like a whale calf that had lost its way, or a discarded football, blackened from lying in the trash. The city hall building is a black steel frame covered with black glass, like a great black mirror you have to pass it to get to the train station. Once, hoping to make myself more inconspicuous, I took to wearing a long black raincoat-but any hope I might have had was swept away when I walked by the new city hall complex on the broad avenue leading up to the station. I stand five feet eight inches tall, weigh two hundred and fifteen pounds, and have round shoulders and stumpy arms and legs. The narrator then goes on to advance the story in an intriguing way: The entire opening paragraph piques our curiosity, but especially the final sentence. My nickname trails after me like a shadow. Besides, I’d rather not run into anyone I know.
It takes me the better part of an hour to drive there, but since my purchases include a lot of specialized items-faucet packing, spare blades for power tools, large laminated dry cells, that sort of thing-the local shops won’t do. Once a month I go shopping downtown, near the prefectural offices.
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